Morning Briefing

"Alcohol abuse is a mammoth public-health problem in Kenya, and the government needs to make drinking more economically painful," Justin Martin, CLAS-Honors Preceptor of Journalism at the University of Maine and a columnist for Columbia Journalism Review, writes in a Christian Science Monitor opinion piece. Martin notes that "[i]n rural Kenyan villages, it is not uncommon to see more pubs than schools or medical clinics." He highlights a 2010 government effort to prohibit the sale of alcohol before 5p.m., but concludes, "A more effective measure, though, would be making Kenyan men pay more for their libations when they shuffle into pubs after quitting time" (7/11).